Professional Responsibilities
Professional Responsibilities
Respiratory Therapists must ensure their professional practice complies with all applicable regulatory requirements. In addition to maintaining registration with the CRTO, RTs must take accountability for their professional practice and abide by both their employer and CRTO obligations. As responsible practitioners RTs place patients’ needs above their own, act as advocates where appropriate and report information that is relevant to their abilities to provide safe, ethical and competent care.
Documentation
The CRTO Documentation PPG and the CRTO Standards of Practice (Standard 7) outlines the principles and standards of documentation that must be maintained by all RRTs in every practice setting. Documentation styles (e.g., narrative charting, charting by exception) and documentation mediums (i.e., paper-based or computer-based) vary from one organization to the next. RTs may utilize any documentation format that meets both the CRTO’s expectation regarding documentation and their employer’s requirements.
An essential foundational principle for all RT documentation is that every client contact must be documented. “Client contact” includes (but is not limited to):
Professional Liability Insurance (PLI)
The Regulated Health Professions Act¹⁶ requires all practising regulated health professionals to carry PLI that meets specific criteria. The CRTO Professional Liability Insurance Policy outlines those requirements, as well as the consequences of an RT not being covered by the requisite amount of PLI.
RTs who are “personally insured” by their employer’s PLI plan in the required amounts and coverage are not obliged to obtain additional liability insurance coverage. “Personally insured” means the employer’s insurance policy covers not just the organization, but the RRT as an individual. The policy does not have to list the RRT by name but must specify that it covers the “employees” of the organization as “added insureds”.
Additional PLI is available for members of the provincial or national professional associations (i.e., the RTSO, CSRT).
More information can be found on the CRTO website regarding the CRTO Professional Liability Insurance Policy.
Reporting Requirements
There are a number of instances where an RRT isrequired to reportspecific information to certain organizations/agencies. Some of these reporting requirements were covered in the section in this document entitled Sharing PHI Outside of the Circle of Care. Some additional agencies that community RTs are required to report to are as follows:
Reporting to the CRTO
There are several instances in which CRTO Members are required to contact the CRTO, such as reporting offences, professional negligence or malpractice, or information regarding registration and conduct.
More about what information must be reported to the CRTO by a Member can be found in the Mandatory Reporting by Members Fact Sheet.
An RT who operates their own business and employs other RRTs has specific reporting requirements to the CRTO. Home care companies and other employers of RRTs are obligated to submit a report to the CRTO if they have reason to believe that an RRT:
has sexually abused a client,
is incompetent or incapacitated, or
has committed an act of professional misconduct
Employers of RTs are also required to report if they terminate or suspend the
employment of an RT or take any other form of disciplinary actions against the RRT.
More information on what must be reported to the CRTO by an employer of RRTs can be found in the Mandatory Facility/Employer Reports Fact Sheet.
Reporting Sexual Abuse of Clients
When an RT has reasonable grounds, obtained in the course of practising the profession, to believe that another RT or regulated health professional has sexually abused a patient, the RRT must file a report in writing with the Registrar of the College to which the alleged abuser belongs. More information on reporting sexual abuse of clients can be found in the CRTO Abuse Awareness and Prevention PPG.
Reporting to Other Agencies
Depending upon the community practice setting, there may be other mandatory reporting requirement to agencies outside of the CRTO that are governed by different legislation (e.g., Long-Term Care Homes Act). Listed below are just a few addition reporting obligations.
How this Guide Links to the Professional Misconduct Regulation
1. BUSINESS PRACTICES
19. Submitting an account or charge for services that a member knows is false or misleading.
20. Charging a fee that is excessive in relation to the service rendered.
21. Failing to disclose the fee schedule or payment structure prior to delivery of services or failing to provide the patient or patient with sufficient time to refuse the treatment and arrange for alternative services.
22. Failing to itemize an account for fees charged by the member for professional services rendered,
i. if requested to do so by the patient or patient or the person or agency who is to pay, in whole or in part, for the services, or
ii. if the account includes a commercial laboratory fee.
23. Selling any debt owed to the member for professional services; this does not include the use of credit cards to pay for professional services.
i How changing patient expectations will impact your practice. http://practicemanagement.dentalproductsrepoRT.com/aRTicle/how-changing-patient-expectations-will-impact-your-practice?page=0,1 (July, 2018)
ii CRTO Standards of Practice, Standard 1 – Business Practices
iii Ibid.
How this Guide Links to the Advertising Regulation
(1) In this Part, an advertisement with respect to a member’s practice includes an advertisement for gases used for medical purposes, equipment, supplies or services that includes a reference to the member’s name.
(2) An advertisement with respect to a member’s practice must not contain,
(a) anything that is false or misleading;
(b) anything that, because of its nature, cannot be verified;
(c) a claim of expertise in any area of practice, or with respect to any procedure or treatment, unless the advertisement discloses the basis of the expertise;
(d) an endorsement other than an endorsement by an organization that is known to have expertise relevant to the subject-matter of the endorsement;
(e) a testimonial by a patient or patient or former patient or patient or by a friend or relative of a patient or patient or former patient or patient; or
(f) anything that promotes or is likely to promote excessive or unnecessary use of services.
(3) An advertisement must be readily comprehensible to the persons to whom it is directed.
(4) A member must not permit his or her name to be used in an advertisement that contravenes subsection (2) or (3).
(5) A member must not advertise by initiating contact, or causing or allowing any person to initiate contact, with potential patients or patients or their personal representatives either in person or by telephone, in an attempt to solicit business.
(6) Despite subsection (5), a member may advertise by initiating contact with a potential patient or a personal representative of a potential patient if the potential patient does not personally use or consume the gases, equipment, supplies or services that are the subject of the advertisement.
(7) A member must not appear in, or permit the use of his or her name in, an advertisement that implies, or could reasonably be interpreted to imply, that the professional expertise of the member is relevant to the subject-matter of the advertisement if it is not relevant. O. Reg. 596/94, s. 23.
FOOTNOTES
16. RHPA. Health Professions Procedural Code. S. 13(1).